the gift that keeps on giving. let's play "hardball." good evening i'm chris matthews in los angeles. let me start tonight with this. we know how mitt romney is without a script the words that come in to his head like the 47% stuff that came out in may is bad. his default switch says blame the little guy, call him a parasite. gifts, that's what the little guy wants. the older person, the hard up

youth, pay up, scratch, cross their palms and they will pull the lever for you. cash and carry. smart conservatives know this is no way to treat a potential voter. it was put this way in the "new york post." romney didn't say the election came out as it did because obama's team outplayed and outfoxed his. he should have because that's the truth. he said obama won the second term through essentially bribery. i have three rules for both parties as they converge to do their jobs. respect the vote are. respect each other's offices and search hard for common ground. that's what we should be doing and guiding our country's conversation. not trashing the people who voted against you but respecting the fact that they did for your own good.

washington bureau chief from mother jones and our political analyst. let's take a look at some of this stuff from john mccain. four years since john mccain lost his presidential bid, ten days since mitt romney lost but they are holding a grudge against the president and their bitter comments this week. listen to romney's conference calm about obama's gifts and mccain's gifts about obama ally susan rice. >> what the president, the president's campaign did was focus on certain members of his base coalition, give them extra financial gift from the government and then work very aggressively to turn them out to vote. >> susan rice should have known better and if she didn't know better she's not qualified. she should have known better. i will do everything in my power to block her from being the united states secretary of state. >> let's go after romney first in a way that he's calculating how he lost. you can give all kinds of reasons when you lose. when you spout the argument that the other guy bought all the interest groups, that seems to

diminish not just the purchaser but the purchase. you're basically saying these people are up for grabs. you'll never get them again. >> exactly. talking about more than half the voting public as bribery victims or being duped. it's ridiculous and insulting. precisely to some of the grownups that republicans need to do better with. latinos were outraged. african-americans were outraged. what they are basically arguing is government is nothing more than a transaction of government giving you things in exchange for votes. it's an understanding of government that to me renders him unfit to be the leader of the united states government if that's what he think government comes down to. the things he was describing that the obama administration did, that is called governing. >> yeah. let's go to david. why would he use words like this. this is the way he thinks unless he's being scripted. this was unscripted. this is the pure romney.

>> chris, i was the first guy in the media to see the 47% remark and when i saw it i couldn't believe it. maybe there was a slight chance that maybe he was saying to it play up to that crowd, that's what they wanted to hear. now when we hear him talk about voters he didn't just say he was bought off, that obama won their votes through bribery. he said i ran a campaign of big ideas. so they are the moochers, they are victims who will pay them the most. in the end what happens, mitt romney portrays himself as a victim of the victims. so just confirms all the worst impressions from the 47% rant and now you have republicans running away from him and basically saying hey don't let the car elevator door hit you on the way out. >> let me go to one thoughtful conservative. who i usually agree with.

he's a smart guy. he writes for "the weekly standard." it seems to me that he has a pretty good point. he says romney's whole campaign was aimed at what he called entrepreneurs, job creators, titans. if you ignore all the people who work for a living, work 400 or whatever, do their jobs. most people are like that. he said if you live in your party simply to people who see themselves as, you know, titans of industry you're going to have a very, very small notion of america. very small electorate working for you. >> this was basically a candidate of the boss and he left basically everyone else to the president, to barack obama. i think if you're going to be the party of just the boss you have to presume a, everyone loves and endorse their boss and vote for a guy who boils down to

being nothing more than a ceo or limit yourself only to the rich or only to people who are not just wealthy but they feel like they are the victims in society. they are actually being put upon by the moochers and everyone else who isn't as good as they are, who doesn't deserve the things they are getting from government. what romney forgets is some of the people who receive from government include his own base. you're talking about seniors who are the largest recipients of government, of government programs so he left off so many people and showed such disdain that it's no wonder he couldn't get a majority of votes. >> let's go through some of the people what he said. i think you're right david they should have known what they were dealing with long before election returns came in. people like to be with win thor, right, left, center. so now you tell us more republicans are backing away from romney's gift language like new mexico governor who said that unfortunately is what sets us back as a party. our comments that are not thought through carefully or marco rubio who told politico i don't want to rebut him point by point but i want to say to you

we have millions of people in this country that don't want to work. i'm not saying that's what he said. i think we have millions of people that are out of work and dependent on the government because they can't find a job. and chris christie had this to say on "morning joe" just today. >> i voted for mitt romney, but the bottom line is we lost so now what we need to do as leaders of our party is pivot and get back to our jobs. if we do our jobs well people will put us back into office. and if we don't, they won't. >> is it time for mitt romney to move on and stop having conference calls? >> that's up to him. mitt romney is a friend of mine. i understand he's very upset about having lost the disappointment. >> it's not helpful. >> of course not but he's a good man but he'll find his level. and i think it's still a little raw.

so do i wish he hadn't said those things? of course not. on the other hand i won't bury the guy for it. >> it's interesting, i want to go back to joy on this. this is sheer human nature. i thought and i like to think i'm fair about this, i thought romney walked off the stage election night as a noble figure in politics. however the campaign had gone in some very bad directions, i believe he ended it in the right direction with nobility and class. he came out there alone. didn't cry on anybody's shoulders. didn't surround himself with family. took the loss, said he had a good running mate, great campaign team and praying for the president. maybe that was shock. he was still, you know, but a week or so out there later he's saying not terrible, we're buying votes and selling votes but making himself look like a jester. >> sneering at the public that refused to take the opportunity to make them their president. i think you're right, chris, a lot of times politicians show

who they really are and show their character in loss. in defeat. almost more than they do in victory. if you recall, yes we can was a concession speech and that was the time when barack obama soared when he lost to hillary clinton in new hampshire. sometimes you show more of who you are in loss. >> i got to go. thank you. you guys are great. coming up. general david petraeus has probably gotten more ink than president barack obama. he testified on what happened whether susan rice was given the facts. we'll talk to a member of the house intelligence committee who was in that room when petraeus spoke in that closed door hearing. the fiscal cliff. how much room will the interest groups give the president to make a deal. they met with the president today and told them where they stand. we'll hear from 2005 them. guess who showed up at parks and recreation last night on the show. >> on behalf of the president and myself --

>> mr. vice president i'm deeply flattered but no way i could take over madam secretary clinton's position. >> joe biden goes hollywood. let me finish tonight with this question. can obama's second term be a true reach for greatness? this is "hardball", the place for politics. ♪

now, that's cardworthy. [ man ] all right. here we go. ♪ cardworthy. [ camera shutter clicks ] cardworthy. ♪ so not cardworthy. ♪ [ female announcer ] go to shutterfly.com for all your cardworthy moments and now get up to 40% off. [ male announcer ] marie callender's puts everything you've grown to love about sunday dinner into each of her pot pies. tender white meat chicken and vegetables in a crust made from scratch. marie callender's. it's time to savor. in a crust made from scratch. try running four.ning a restaurant is hard, fortunately we've got ink. it gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable,

plus at office supply stores. rewards we put right back into our business. this is the only thing we've ever wanted to do and ink helps us do it. make your mark with ink from chase.

welcome back to "hardball." david petraeus has been headline news all week and for all the wrong reasons. his extramarital affair with his biographer paula broadwell. today he was on capitol hill talking about a less prurient but more consequential matter, the attack on americans on benghazi. arriving through a secret entrance this morning, the former cia director made his way to the hill for closed meetings with the house and the senate intelligence committees to testify about that september 11th attack, an event he said

and always believed was an act of terrorism. democratic congressman adam schiff from california sits on the intelligence committee and was in the hearing room this morning. congressman, this is so sensitive. is it true or not true that the united nations ambassador susan rice was given the correct known information about what happened in benghazi when she went on those five television shows on sunday a few days after the attack? was she given the accurate, up-to-date information on what happened, that it was a terrorist attack? >> she was given the best assessment the intelligence committee had at the time. i asked general petraeus, were the talking points we were given their best intelligence assessment at the time and they were given that late in the day on saturday, late in the afternoon, and he said, yes. these are -- this was the best assessment they could do without disclosing classified information --

>> whoa, whoa, stop right there. he also said according to what i heard in the testimony today that he always believed there was a terrorist attack. >> yes, he did. >> how can that be both true? if he gave her the honest testimony to give to the television programs that sunday after the attack, which was a terrorist attack, then she never got told that. he knew it and didn't tell her. >> well, no, you know, i think what the general was saying that when he first briefed the congress he felt, and i think many of us did, you shoot mortars and rpgs at an american diplomatic post, that's an act of diplomatic terror. the question was who committed the acts and how do we find them and bring them to justice. what the intelligence community got wrong, and the general acknowledged that this was wrong, is that they thought initially that this was a protest that was either hijacked or got out of control that certainly terrorists and extremists were involved in, but that it began with a protest. it did not begin with a protest.

but the key thing in terms of the ambassador is the ambassador was given, as we were, the best assessment at the time as flawed as that was -- >> i am a clear thinker, let's be clear here. did he believe from the very earliest dispatches he got and cables he got on this, did he believe it began as a protest or did he believe it was always a terrorist operation? >> no, he believed that it began as a protest, but he also believed that terrorists and extremists were involved. that's i think consistent with what he said at the time although, you know, at the time he also caveated, as all of the intelligence community did, that these were very initial reports, that they were going to get a lot more information, and that we needed to be concerned -- >> let's try it again. let's try it again. from what i understand today is he said he didn't give her all the information because he wanted to give up some classified so he wouldn't give up our sources over there -- >> chris, first of all, he

didn't say he gave her this information. >> well, the cia director signed off on the talking points that she used to go on the tv shows, isn't that right? >> he said he signed off on the talking points that we were given to members of congress. he doesn't know what talking points the ambassador was given, >> we want to get you live right now to thailand where we're standing by for a press conference with president obama and the prime minister of thailand. the president is in the middle of a four-day trip through southeast asia. let's go ahead and take a listen. >> this will then will be followed by the honorable barack obama, the president of the united states. there will be then a short session of questions and answers from the media. at this juncture, ladies and

gentlemen, may invite the prime minister of the kingdom of thailand to say a few words. ladies and gentlemen of the media. let me start by once again welcoming president barack obama and his delegation to thailand. thailand is the first country president obama choose to visit following his decisive re-election two weeks ago. we appreciate the significance, mr. president, and we thank you for being here today. president obama's visit is the perfect occasion to launch a celebration of 180 implemented

next year. i thank both president obama and secretary clinton for actively promoting thai-u.s. relations and for constructing engagement asia. this afternoon i have the honors of accompanying the president for an audience with his majesty, the king. reflecting the relationship between our two countries at the highest level. lastly at the bilateral meetings we had productive and wide ranging discussion and a friendly partnership. thailand is the oldest treatied ally of the u.s. in asia and a long lasting one because of our shared commitment to democracy, human rights and free market. i expressed to the president

that it is my firm commitment to the people to preserve and protect the democratic system, and i appreciate the support in thailand. i i agree that democracy will lead to economic process. as we agree that sell bratding is not enough, we look to the future and stronger partnership that benefit both countries and indeed the broader regions on the economic front, to generate growth and create job for both thai and americans. the president and i agree to double our effort to promote investment and people-to-people exchanges. we will also strengthen our cooperation in energy and

securities. furthermore we agree that target is a -- location and the asian communities, we will work together to make this, contributing towards global economic opportunities within this context, i inform the president that thailand will initiate negotiation and undertake the necessary process. the president and i had wide ranging discussion about regional shoe and i welcome his upcoming visit to myanmar.

we believe our bilateral partnership can help contribute to regional peace, securities and prosperity. but our cooperation goes beyond the regions. at the global level thailand is concern concerned with weapons of mass destruction. i informed the president that thailand will enjoy the proliferation security initiative of psi. we believe psi will help them from following into the wrong hands. which is in the shared interest of all. the president and i also discuss on how to tackle human

trafficings. i reaffirm my commitment to fight human trafficking. we also discuss cooperation on combatting terrorisms and how to deal with the climate change issue, especially in the terms of disaster relief. finally we recognize the consultation tweep our two countries. the president and i agreed to stay in close touch and to have our administration agency do the same. >> thank you very much. i will invite the honorable barack obama, president of the united states to say a few words. >> thank you very much. good evening to the people of

thailand who have welcomed me so graciously. let me say the prime minister's english is much better than my thai. but i want to say thank you so much madame prime minister for your warm welcome, your generous words, and the sense of partnership that you bring to our work today. as you ind kalted asia is my first trip since our election in the united states. and thailand is my first stop, and this is no accident. as i have said many times. the united states is and always will be a pacific nation. as the fastest growing region in the world, the ash pacific will shape so much of our security and prosperity ahead and it's critical creating job and opportunities for the american

people. and a corner sfoen of our strategy is our strong and enduring treaty alliance, which includes our alliance with thailand. next year will mark 180 years of diplomatic relations. we've been treaty allies for nearly 60 years. our men and women of uniform have stood together and bled together. our business people worked together to create jobs for both our peoples. diplomats, researches and student partners work together every day so that our citizens and the people across this region with work in peace and security and dignity. and we are very admiring of the

efforts that have been made. earlier today i had the great honor of the audience of your majesty the king. and today i'm proud to stand behind the democratically elected leader of thailand and reaffirm the importance of holding democracy, governess, rule of law, all of which i know you believe in deeply. when we met last year the president and i discussed how to deepen and broaden the partnerships between our countries. i'm pleased we have agreed to a series of efforts that revitalize the alliance to meet the challenges and opportunities of our time. first we're deepening our security operation. our militaries already train and

exercise together. we're already close partners in preventing terrorism and combatting trafficking. now we're going to approve the abilities of the militaries to work together. help thai forces secure greater forces in the region to preventing piracy. i especially want to commend thailand for joining the proliferation commuter administration that prevents the spread of the weapons of mass destruction. taken together they secure a peaceful rez igs nagt where all nations are upheld. second we're taking steps to expand trade and investment. we're already one of the biggest investors in thailand. we believe we can do even more. so we've agreed to reconvene our trade and investment council to

explore new ways to do business together. we'll don't work with our partners to reduce barriers and move towards a seamless regional economy. and we'll work together as thailand begins to lay the ground work for joining high standard trade agreements such as the partnership. this will advance our vision of a region where trade is free and fair and all nations play it by the rules. third on this 50th anniversary of the peace corps in thailand, we're moving ahead with new partnerships to promote development and human dignity. we'll focus on public health, developing a vaccine for hiv/aids and ensuring the vaccine is stable. we are trying to con front modern slavery, human

trafficking. thailand is also taking measures to better protect and empower women and girls. we all agree it's a very important issue. and given thailand's role as an emerging company, i'm pleased our nations will work closely to promote development in other countries. we also welcome the leadership thailand has taken in protecting wildlife around the world. it's something thailand should be proud of. thailand supported the cause of democracy in burma, hosting refugees and promoting reform. and i very much appreciate the prime minister's insights as i prepare to visit tomorrow.